Risque songs pre-90s

[Brandon Pierce]

I just got my hands on a Cyndi Lauper CD (mostly just to get the song "Goonies R Good Enough"), and heard the song She-Bop. I had heard the song before, but never really knew what the lyrics were. I was reading the bio on Lauper, and it mentioned how She-Bop was supposed to be a song about masturbation. I listened to the song, and yep, it's definetely implied in the song.

Although, it may not seem like much now, but something like that had to have been out-of-place for the 80s, and music didn't really become a common dirty thing until possibly the mid-nineties. So the topic I'm starting here, are risque songs you can think of pre-90s.

Although drug-related songs may not be considered "risque", but I thought I'd comment on the Beatles' song Day Tripper, and the song Horse With No Name (I forget the guy who sang that), as being songs somewhat ahead of their time.

[Peter Paltridge]

"Bad, bad, bad, bad boys, you make me feel so good." --somebody

That has to take the cake because there's no way around it. At least with She-Bop, it could be interpreted as talking about dancing (that's what I thought it was.....I could make an easy joke about Lauper here but I'd get in trouble) And it WAS in the 80's--my mom hated it, probably because she feared I'd wonder what the lady was talking about.

[the Amanda]

For the record, She-Bop is not the only 80's song which implies masturbation. There's also Relax, Shock the Monkey, Whip It, and Turning Japanese. And I think it was the early nineties that gave us I Touch Myself.

[ManicWebb]

I'm a big R&B fan, and most of my family also listens to it. I love it when someone from an older generation says music in their day wasn't as sexual as music today, because then I get to use this example...

"Cruisin' " by Smokey Robinson
This song is unappologetically sexual. The chorus is innocent enough, as "I love it when we're cruisin' together" sounds like a song about two lovers getting away. The verses are nasty as all get-out. "And if you want it, you got it forever / I could just lay there inside you and love you, baby." "Baby, let's cruise / Let's float. Let's glide. / Let's open up / And come inside." I know. I was surprised, too.

[Michael24]

^ Oh God! Never realized that. Now I'll never be able to listen to the Huey Lewis/Gwenyth Paltrow cover the same way again. LOL!!

Speaking of Huey Lewis (and The News), "Whole Lotta Lovin'" from 1986 is on the risque side, with lines like.....

* "Late last night I read the letter you sent/Woke up this morning under a tent"
* "I'm all alone but my bed's big enough for a party of five"
* "Everybody else is a-holding hands/I'm here lonely, playing around with my microphone stand."

[EinBebop]

For the record, She-Bop is not the only 80's song which implies masturbation. There's also Relax, Shock the Monkey, Whip It, and Turning Japanese.

I'd been told Billy Idol's "Dancin' with Myself" was in that category, also.

[ManicWebb]

VH1 had one of those specials where they talk about old songs and celebrities, and they people who recorded "Turning Japanese" claim the song is really about awkward feelings, like when you feel like you're turning into someone else...

[Tanooki]

don't forget another beatle's classic "lucy in the sky with diamonds". it's a song about LSD

[Stewie]

This is all really before my time, but I at least know about 2 Live Crew.

don't forget another beatle's classic "lucy in the sky with diamonds". it's a song about LSD

No it's not. It's about a drawing that Sean Lennon made.
What next? "Louie Louie"?

[Feslmogh]

Telephone Man - Meri Wilson
Peter The Meter Reader - Meri Wilson
Everybody Wants My Fanny - Benny Bell
Shaving Cream - Benny Bell
Entering Marion - John Forster

[Kathy Kane]

How about "Sexual Healing" By Al Green, that was a good to get in to the mood.

[Andy Mancini]

I'm shocked that no one has mentioned "Afternoon Delight" by the Starland Vocal Band yet. They don't even try to hide sexuality in that song. Sample lyric:

"Started out this morning feeling so polite,
I always thought a fish could not be caught who didn't bite.
But you got some bait a-waiting and I think I might
try nibblin' a little Afternoon Delight"

Yeah... creepy, isn't it?

EDIT: "Sexual Healing" is by Marvin Gaye, not Al Green.

[Aquadementia]

What, like something magic happened in 1990 where everything became so much less repressed?
Come on, could you get any more direct then "Let's spend the night together" by the Rolling Stones?
Sex drugs and Rock'n Roll wasn't just a cliche.

For the record, She-Bop is not the only 80's song which implies masturbation. There's also Relax, Shock the Monkey, Whip It, and Turning Japanese. And I think it was the early nineties that gave us I Touch Myself.

That's quite a list. I look forward to reading your term paper on this subject.
But I think you're reading too much into it with "Whip It" and "Relax" seems to be more generally about sex.

And let us never forget though about "My ding-a-ling" ............. as sung by Millhouse. (Edit: Now that I think about it, it could have been a different kid.)

[Tay the Cat]

For the record, She-Bop is not the only 80's song which implies masturbation. There's also Relax,

Not quite. The songwriter, Holly Johnson, admitted that it was about gay sex.

[Ed Liu]

Howdy,

And let us never forget though about "My ding-a-ling" ............. as sung by Millhouse. (Edit: Now that I think about it, it could have been a different kid.)

The original "My Ding-a-Ling" (or at least the one I was familiar with) was by Chuck Berry, and was recorded in the 1960's or 1970's, I think.

There's a much longer tradition of double-ententre (and occasionally single-entendre) songs in pop music that stretches back to the earliest days of recorded music, and probably before that. One example I can come up with that people will be familiar with is "Shake, Rattle, and Roll," originally sung by Big Joe Turner but covered more famously in the 1950's by Bill Haley and the Comets. "I'm like a one-eyed cat peepin' in a seafood store" is the line that survived into Bill Haley's cleaner version, but Big Joe Turner got even raunchier in some versions of the original. Big Joe also did a song called "Big 10 Inch" which was about how he wanted to show a girl his big 10 inch...record of the blues that he had just recorded. I think Aerosmith covered that one in the 70's or 80's.

Muddy Waters gets pretty explicit about it in "Got My Mojo Working," "Catfish Blues," and "Hoochie Coochie Man," and those date to the late 40's and early 50's. I think that was when the earliest recorded version of "Play With Your Poodle" was done, although it's probably older than that.

Robert Johnson was telling someone to "squeeze his lemon" back in the 1930's before Led Zeppelin borrowed the song and made it more explicit on Led Zeppelin II. Victoria Spivey and Ma Rainey, who sang back in the 1910's and 20's, supposedly had songs that were extremely risque, and had more than a few that couldn't be played on the radio today without causing a ruckus.

Ain't nothing new under the sun. I'm sure you could find double-entendre songs from ancient Greece or China if you dug deep enough.

-- Ed/Ace

[randomguy]

Yeah, I wouldn't set the bar of when risque songs became acceptable as 1990. It'd probably be somewhere around the 1960s, when sex, drugs, and rock and roll really took off.

Hell, some of those old vaudeville songs are pretty risque, and those date back to what, the 1910s? Twenties?

[Aquadementia]

Howdy,


The original "My Ding-a-Ling" (or at least the one I was familiar with) was by Chuck Berry, and was recorded in the 1960's or 1970's, I think.

Yeah, I love Chuck Berry, but when he sings that song it's just tacky, like a fountain with a statue of a little boy relieving himself, but sung on the Simpsons by a kid in a talent show who probably doesn't know what it's about yet seems uncomfortable with it, that's funny.

[Zorak Masaki]

How about that song "under the boardwalk". Im surprised it gets airplay on oldies stations, considering the chorus goes, "under the boardwalk, we'll be making love" (i hope nobody walking on the boardwalk happens to glance between the cracks). And of course, 80% of 80s hair metal (lets put the x in sex, girls girls girls, etc)

[Aquadementia]

How about that song "under the boardwalk". Im surprised it gets airplay on oldies stations, considering the chorus goes, "under the boardwalk, we'll be making love" (i hope nobody walking on the boardwalk happens to glance between the cracks). And of course, 80% of 80s hair metal (lets put the x in sex, girls girls girls, etc)

I thought it was "We'll be FALLING in love" It sort of has different tone to it. Though maybe it's one of those lines that people can take liberties with.

Then there is the Beach Boys version that if my memory and the internet are correct goes "Boardwalk .... I wanna take you girl ..... under the boardwalk ..... I'm gonna take you girl ..... under the boardwalk"
where I think they are trying to have it both ways.

[Chris Wood]

Profanity laden-music may have only become common after 1990, but risque music has been around for decades. As a huge hard rock fan, I can think of dozens of examples.

Caution - sleazy innuendo follows:

Aerosmith (1975)

"Last night I tried to tease her
I gave my love a little pinch
She said now stop that jivin'
Now whip out your big 10 inch..."

AC\DC (1976)

"My balls are always bouncing
to the left and to the right
It's my belief that my big balls
should be held every night"

Whitesnake (1984)

"I'm gonna slide it in
Right to the top,
Slide it in
I ain't never gonna stop..."